🎯 Axios PM: Trump's middle finger

Good afternoon. Today's newsletter, edited by Sam Baker, is 433 words, a 2-min. read. Thanks to Sheryl Miller for copy editing.

President-elect Trump, baffling even his Republican backers, walked out of today's transition-to-power meeting with President Biden and announced he'll nominate Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) as attorney general.

• If he's confirmed, Gaetz will head the Justice Department, which last year decided not bring to charges against him over sex trafficking allegations,
• This came minutes after Trump named former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard to head the U.S. intelligence community — and 12 hours after he nominated "Fox & Friends Weekend" co-host Pete Hegseth to run the Pentagon.

⚡️ Why it matters: Trump is taunting his critics with three highly controversial picks for three of the most important jobs in the land.

🔎 Zoom in: Gaetz, who is currently under investigation by the House Ethics Committee for sexual misconduct, is a MAGA provocateur and Trump loyalist despised by many of his colleagues.

• Gabbard, a former Democratic congresswoman, secretly met with Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in 2017 and blamed the U.S. and NATO for Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
• Hegseth, a decorated Army veteran, lobbied Trump to pardon U.S. service members accused of war crimes and has argued women should not serve in combat roles.

The GOP establishment, such as it is, scored a major victory today when Sen. John Thune of South Dakota won the race for Senate majority leader.

• Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) had tried to position himself as the anti-establishment, Trump-aligned option to lead the Senate GOP. He had the backing of Elon Musk and Tucker Carlson — but his Senate colleagues eliminated him on the first ballot.

🗓️ Thune will officially take over as majority leader in January.

• Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming will be the Senate GOP's No. 2 leader, and Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas easily won the No. 3 job.

Trump's controversial nominees will be one of the new leadership team's first challenges.

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The impact: Built-in limits give parents more peace of mind when it comes to protecting their teens.

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1. 💸 After Election Day, Republicans are feeling positive about the economy for the first time in four years — while the Democratic vibes plunged. Go deeper.
2. ⚖️ Ted Olson, the conservative super-lawyer, died at age 84. Olson argued the Bush side of Bush v. Gore in 2000, then he became one of the leading legal advocates for same-sex marriage. Go deeper.
3. 🏈 USC football coach Lincoln Riley was placed on probation for violating NCAA rules on the size of his coaching staff. Go deeper.

Cranes lifted the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree into place on Saturday.

• This year's tree is 74 feet tall and approximately 11 tons.

Instagram Teen Accounts help parents support teens as they grow. Teen Accounts include automatic protections limiting who can contact teens and what content they see.

The impact: More protections for teens, and peace of mind for parents.

Learn more.